New Paper that Addresses Historical & Doctrinal Issues

[DBMormon]

5 minutes ago, Tacenda said:

I've never read the CES letter because it's overwhelming with all the info. This seems more concise and I like the three different viewpoints.

I've yet to read it throughly. Bill if you're reading, is it something you would show someone who is doubting the church or who has questions? I think I probably know the answer, that you would. 

I'm amazed that you are still an active LDS that holds callings. I know your recent calling was as a teacher. Maybe your calling is different now? Apparently your bishop and stake president don't mind the stuff you put on your FB page as far as exposing the various issues with church history etc. 

You have always been extremely open with your views! And I'm fascinated that you still attend as if everything is fine and dandy. Take care!!

my goal was to provide a starting point on the tough issues where the member in a faith transition and the loving full believing member could begin to talk vulnerably about these issues and why we think about them so differently.    The problem with the CES letter and Mormon Think is they represent non-faithful side and just the tone would be a put off for a full believing member. I also wanted to be general and allow the reader to go study where they wanted.

[DBMormon]

11 minutes ago, juliann said:

I got a kick out of the so-called orthodox view being painted in opposition to an apologetic view in all of this. Line me up 20 believing members who fit neatly into any of these categories. 

Can you find me another document that does better?  Can you invent a better way without it running into the hundreds of pages? just curious.  

[hope_for_things]

11 minutes ago, Calm said:

Of course they do.  But if the claim is otherwise, if the claim is to accurately represent others' POV, that accuracy and the effort put into presenting an accurate view can be accessed.

Given the amount of space, the amount of effort put into showing nuances, the amount of quoting for documentation, the amount of absolutes include, it becomes obvious in my view that this is not a balanced presentation of 4 different viewpoints, but an argument for one viewpoint, Reel's, which he has labeled as "Progressive"...even the label is an argument that it is an more evolved, more elevated position.

He's attempting to be fair to the various viewpoints, he's not claiming perfection, and yes there is a use of labels as well, and I think he'd acknowledge the limitations of labeling up front.  

Your complaints and reasoning for dismissing this seem more personal and prejudiced than an even handed review of that material.  

[Calm]

26 minutes ago, hope_for_things said:

  If you have an issue with anything, why not provide feedback rather than dismiss it entirely?  

I find it fundamentally flawed based on the obvious need to elevate the Progressive position above the others.

If Reel is serious about producing such a thing, I would suggest soliciting writers from the various categories to not only summarize their own positions, but to provide their own label and definition of their group.  And then have others from their groups critique the effort.  First independently of the other categories and then engaging with what others have written in order to create better contrast and comparison.  Hopefully a coherent, useful summary could be put together then.

Edited May 1, 2017 by Calm

[hope_for_things]

Just now, Calm said:

I find it fundamentally flawed based on the obvious need to elevate the Progressive position above the others.

If Reel is serious about producing such a thing, I would suggest soliciting writers from the various categories to not only summarize their own positions, but to provide their own label and definition of their group.  And then have others from their groups critique the effort.

Thats not a bad idea, and I'm guessing that since he's open to feedback, that he's already solicited input from different viewpoints. I don't think everyone would ever be completely satisfied, you can't please everyone and do so when you're trying to keep things concise.  

[DBMormon]

6 minutes ago, hope_for_things said:

He's attempting to be fair to the various viewpoints, he's not claiming perfection, and yes there is a use of labels as well, and I think he'd acknowledge the limitations of labeling up front.  

Your complaints and reasoning for dismissing this seem more personal and prejudiced than an even handed review of that material.  

I would admit fully to be this concise I had to sacrifice something and doubt highly there is something as short.  Or something that represents several views as fairly. 

[juliann]

5 minutes ago, Calm said:

I find it fundamentally flawed based on the obvious need to elevate the Progressive position above the others.

If Reel is serious about producing such a thing, I would suggest soliciting writers from the various categories to not only summarize their own positions, but to provide their own label and definition of their group.  And then have others from their groups critique the effort.  First independently of the other categories and then engaging with what others have written in order to create better contrast and comparison.  Hopefully a coherent, useful summary could be put together then.

What she said.

But I tire of efforts to pigeon hole believers while expecting free editing advice. 

[Calm]

5 minutes ago, hope_for_things said:

He's attempting to be fair to the various viewpoints, he's not claiming perfection, and yes there is a use of labels as well, and I think he'd acknowledge the limitations of labeling up front.  

Your complaints and reasoning for dismissing this seem more personal and prejudiced than an even handed review of that material.  

Or perhaps your critique of my critique is more of a need to be supportive of Bill than be even handed.  

I do not deny I am prejudiced in regards to Reel based on his past efforts of presenting various faithful POVs as well as church leadership, history, and doctrine.  My expectation was that there would be likely problems with accuracies, but I believe I have presented enough examples in my edited post to demonstrate I am on solid ground to be concerned.

I did not claim he was not attempting to be fair to the viewpoints, I have only claimed he failed.  If my criticism has appeared to imply otherwise, my apologies for poorly writing what I meant.

[DBMormon]

6 minutes ago, Calm said:

I find it fundamentally flawed based on the obvious need to elevate the Progressive position above the others.

If Reel is serious about producing such a thing, I would suggest soliciting writers from the various categories to not only summarize their own positions, but to provide their own label and definition of their group.  And then have others from their groups critique the effort.  First independently of the other categories and then engaging with what others have written in order to create better contrast and comparison.  Hopefully a coherent, useful summary could be put together then.

I am truly open to constructive feedback but wonder if there is anything that attempts to accomplish what this paper sets out to do that is as concise and objective? Not that this project cant be improved but rather the unwillingness on some to validate this might be the best thing out there on the very things they are criticizing.   That in and of itself seems highly biased.

 

[Calm]

4 minutes ago, DBMormon said:

I would admit fully to be this concise I had to sacrifice something and doubt highly there is something as short.  Or something that represents several views as fairly. 

If I saw evidence of a more or less equal sacrifice for conciseness in the Progressive viewpoint, I would likely find it less of a propaganda piece for your own viewpoints.

Just because it might be the best thing out there doesn't preclude it from being pretty useless or inaccurate.

Edited May 1, 2017 by Calm

[juliann]

1 minute ago, DBMormon said:

I would admit fully to be this concise I had to sacrifice something and doubt highly there is something as short.  Or something that represents several views as fairly. 

Here is a liberal/progressive-orthodox-apologist viewer who is telling you outright, along with others, that this does not represent views fairly because it is not representing them accurately. 

[DBMormon]

1 minute ago, Calm said:

If I saw evidence of a more or less equal sacrifice for conciseness in the Progressive viewpoint, I would likely find it less of a propaganda piece for your own viewpoints.

Just because it might be the best thing out there doesn't preclude it from being pretty useless or inaccurate.

strangely I have received about 100 responses thus far to the paper.  I released it yesterday morning.  95% of those responded positively that this would be helpful to their relationships with church and family.  Again not that it is perfect but your view seems way more one sided than my paper.

[JulieM]

36 minutes ago, Buckeye said:

I like Bill a lot so I skimmed the article. At this point, I don't see the article as having too much value. There simply is not enough detail. For instance, in discussing the different first vision accounts, the orthodox is said to think the differences are "inconsequential"; the critic thinks the differences are "irreconcilable"; and the apologist tries to minimize the differences. These descriptions may be true, but they're not very helpful without actually setting out the differences so that the reader can judge. Hopefully the document expands (and I do like the idea of allowing for each 'group' to speak for itself) but at this point I don't see this document helping anyone.

I can see your point (I'm still reading through it...).

It doesn't give a lot of detail, but to me it looks like it was written to not be extremely lengthy.  I think many people stop reading when it gets too in depth or bogged down with too many details.

But for those who do want more, the references look to be excellent (I've clicked on a few and read some of them). I'm already familiar with Fair and go there often, but haven't seen some of the others.

I understand that there needed to be "categories" too, even though I'm really not a fan of labels, etc.

I can tell a lot of work went into this and even though it's somewhat brief regarding some of the info, there's more to dig into if one wants to (by following the sources).

[DBMormon]

Happy what did you think of the artwork?

 

[Calm]

50 minutes ago, DBMormon said:

don't you also find it odd that an entity that one has loyalty to should not be criticized and regardless of the merit of the experience of the person criticizing (If it harms, causes trauma, and marginalizes). 

If I actually ever claimed this, you might have a point.  My criticism of your "Church as abusive father" is based on the in my view overblown and pejorative content of that criticism, not that it is simply criticism.

Edited May 1, 2017 by Calm

[DBMormon]

Just now, JulieM said:

I can see your point (I'm still reading through it...).

It doesn't give a lot of detail, but to me it looks like it was written to not be extremely lengthy.  I think many people stop reading when it gets too in depth or bogged down with too many details.

But for those who do want more, the references look to be excellent (I've clicked on a few and read some of them). I'm already familiar with Fair and go there often, but haven't seen some of the others.

I understand that there needed to be "categories" too, even though I'm really not a fan of labels, etc.

I can tell a lot of work went into this and even though it's somewhat brief regarding some of the info, there's more to dig into if one wants to (by following the sources).

thank you.  I appreciate your response.

[juliann]

Your audience is critics and progressives.....that should tell you all you need to know right there. 

[DBMormon]

I went to great length to include full spectrum of footnotes and sources with equal emphasis in the resources to the various places along the spectrum.  I truly think this is as fair a short dive into these issues and as you (Julie M)  point out I tried to give the reader a plethora of links to go into a deeper dive on any given issue.

 

Edited May 1, 2017 by DBMormon

[bluebell]

46 minutes ago, Calm said:

Read the rest of my now edited post.

It has to be in part about the person because it was written within his paradigm.

If you read the rest of my post you will see the evidence I provide for my argument his bias has created a useful summary of his own perspectives of these issues, but not of others' paradigms.

From my perspective, the arguments on others' paradigms are somewhat insulting.  Stating "The Orthodox LaƟer‐day Saints finds it crucial to be up to date on where the Church stands on soda pop, different types of tea, and whether sanka or postum are in the same category as coffee." seems more like a caricature of a paradigm than an actual paradigm.  

[Calm]

2 minutes ago, JulieM said:

I can see your point (I'm still reading through it...).

It doesn't give a lot of detail, but to me it looks like it was written to not be extremely lengthy.  I think many people stop reading when it gets too in depth or bogged down with too many details.

But for those who do want more, the references look to be excellent (I've clicked on a few and read some of them). I'm already familiar with Fair and go there often, but haven't seen some of the others.

I understand that there needed to be "categories" too, even though I'm really not a fan of labels, etc.

I can tell a lot of work went into this and even though it's somewhat brief regarding some of the info, there's more to dig into if one wants to (by following the sources).

It might be better to simply provide the links under the categories without commentary or to quote directly from them to allow the reader to come to a conclusion about their beliefs rather than provide an lacking in nuance and inaccurate summary.

Less baggaged labels could be choosing a website as 'typical' of the group as the label.

[bluebell]

8 minutes ago, DBMormon said:

strangely I have received about 100 responses thus far to the paper.  I released it yesterday morning.  95% of those responded positively that this would be helpful to their relationships with church and family.  Again not that it is perfect but your view seems way more one sided than my paper.

I think you would need to know if those people are critics/progressives or orthodox, etc. before you could really judge how helpful the reviews are. 

I find that people who hold the opinion or belief system that is presented as superior will almost always like the presentation much more than the ones who hold the opinion that is presented as inferior.  That's human nature and doesn't speak at all about the actual bias in the presentation.

[Calm]

12 minutes ago, DBMormon said:

 Post 1:  strangely I have received about 100 responses thus far to the paper.  I released it yesterday morning.  95% of those responded positively that this would be helpful to their relationships with church and family.  Again not that it is perfect but your view seems way more one sided than my paper....

Post 2:  I went to great length to include full spectrum of footnotes and sources with equal emphasis in the resources to the various places along the spectrum.  I truly think this is as fair a short dive into these issues and as you (Julie M)  point out I tried to give the reader a plethora of links to go into a deeper dive on any given issue.

 

Feedback was asked for, I provided some. Were you only looking for positive comments applauding the work?

I am not concerned with the resources in my above criticism.  I didn't see that as unique as there are hubs out there that do somewhat the same thing.  That part could very well be useful.  However the commentary provided taints perception too heavily in one direction imo and does not allow the resources to be front and center, to speak for themselves.  The resources are best, imo, separated from the commentary and the commentary if it is felt to be required started from scratch and written by those who hold those positions rather than the extensive and inaccurate paraphrasing.

Edited May 1, 2017 by Calm

[JLHPROF]

I think this document is as simplified a list of the various viewpoints and approaches to issues that trouble some people as you are likely to find.

That being said, I don't think it serves much purpose.
I sincerely doubt any member questioning will find their testimonies restored by reading such a work.  I doubt that any critic will be reconverted.  I doubt any faithful TBM will find a strengthened understanding and commitment to the gospel.
In short, this does little more than gather together doubts into a list and virtually nothing to help with them.

But it's a useful source of viewpoint basics.  Kind of reminds me of https://gregkofford.com/products/this-is-my-doctrine

[hope_for_things]

19 minutes ago, Calm said:

Or perhaps your critique of my critique is more of a need to be supportive of Bill than be even handed.  

I do not deny I am prejudiced in regards to Reel based on his past efforts of presenting various faithful POVs as well as church leadership, history, and doctrine.  My expectation was that there would be likely problems with accuracies, but I believe I have presented enough examples in my edited post to demonstrate I am on solid ground to be concerned.

I did not claim he was not attempting to be fair to the viewpoints, I have only claimed he failed.  If my criticism has appeared to imply otherwise, my apologies for poorly writing what I meant.

Thanks for the honesty and for owning up your perspective.  I was defending Bill, admittedly and I think giving someone the benefit of the doubt is only fair, but that is especially difficult when there is a past history of interactions.  

I can appreciate his overall effort at the same time as recognizing that there are areas for improvement.  Any work towards building understanding between different perspectives is a work that I appreciate.  If it was easy to do, then it would have already been done.  I applaud the effort.  

[Calm]

I have read the thread backwards so may have missed a post I would want to respond to, my apologies if so, but at this point will not go through a third time to be sure.

I think I have made the position of why I find the commentary inaccurate and inappropriate sufficiently clear, with documentation of specific examples in my first or second post in the thread.  If you missed the edited version, you might want to go back and read it if you want to understand my position.  I did not expect the thread to take off so quickly, I would have been more systematic in answering if I had.

I doubt I will respond more as I can't think there is much more of substance I want to say, it would likely be repetitive.  I may say something if I see my position significantly misrepresented.